


I Took You Back A Thousand Times

by musiclily88



Series: Wasted Youth// There Wasn't Much to Waste [26]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Adultery, Age Difference, BDSM, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Childhood Sexual Abuse, Depression, Drug Use, Dysthymia, F/F, Gen, Harry is a princess ugh, Implied Sexual Content, Lots of Arguing, M/M, Neglect, Past Sexual Abuse, Recreational Drug Use, Seriously if this stuff triggers you please don't read, Sub Harry, Subdrop, Subspace, Tattoos, stupid jokes about daddy play, this is so fucked up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-15
Updated: 2014-04-15
Packaged: 2018-01-19 12:44:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1470304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musiclily88/pseuds/musiclily88
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You always want exactly what you can’t have.”</p><p>--<br/>OR, everyone in this chapter is a ridiculous dumbass.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Took You Back A Thousand Times

**Author's Note:**

> This actively hurt me to write. Like, my heart is in tiny, shattered slivers that have fallen to the floor. I AM IN AGONY. Also I apologize.

Louis and Zayn lay in silence for a few more moments, with Louis staring languidly at the ceiling. He spotted a line of dust and cobwebs in the corner, and for some reason this made him smirk. He had absolutely no desire to do anything about it, but the fact that even his catalogue-image room had spots of imperfection brought him…sick pleasure? Idiotic joy? He was unsure.

He cottoned back into the conversation they were having. “I don’t know what I want. What, or where. Or who.”

Zayn snorted again. “Yeah, sure.” He rolled his eyes. “Like it’s so hard to figure you out.”

Louis blinked, considering this with half-interest. “Oh? Enlighten the peasants, then, if you’re so smart.”

Zayn slowly set aside the piece, the bowl finally cashed again. “You always want exactly what you can’t have.”

“Like what?”

“Like me,” Zayn replied with a shrug and an arched eyebrow.

“I have had you,” Louis reminded him. “Repeatedly.”

“You know what I mean. You don’t have me. Not—not like you had Liam. You _had him_ for a bit there. And you’ll never have me like that, which is why you want it. Me. You’ll let me ride your heart til you drop down dead, because I’m fucking unattainable. And part of you believes you’ll get me someday, and that you’ll have _earned_ it, really gotten something just for being _you._ And that’s shitty. For you and for everyone else.”

“Christ, I’m so sick of everyone trying to diagnose and fix me.” Louis lurched to his feet, fumbling for a pack of cigarettes on his bedside table. “You gonna fix me, Zayn? Think you’re qualified to manage my problems? Gonna fuck the crazy out of me? You’re more than welcome to try, if you think you’re good for it.” 

As he lit a fag and picked up the empty ashtray from his table, he realized he was echoing the thoughts that Liam had recently spat at him. He flushed slightly.

“You’re clearly not capable of figuring out how to fix yourself. Maybe someone’s gotta do it for you.”

Louis shoved the lit cigarette in between his lips and spoke around it. “Big strong man gonna fix me? Get me to sit on your lap and ask for a pretty future for Christmas? You gonna fix me, Daddy?” He smirked, offsetting his cheekbones prettily.

“Do you even fucking _care?”_ Zayn leapt to his feet and shoved at Louis, pinning him to the doorframe of the bathroom. “Do you even care at all?”

“I care too much, you twat. That’s the fucking point.” The cherry of Louis’ cigarette hung dangerous between them, threatening to burn Zayn’s facial hair, emitting a haze of smoke around both their faces.

“I don’t want you,” Zayn spat. “I don’t want you, okay, because I get you and know you and I _am_ you. You, but with some insight, maybe, or some desire to make something good of the trash skip that is my life, okay? It’s too exhausting, being bruised all the time, and I feel bad that you feel bad, and I know you’re going through some shit, but get it together!”

Louis grappled slightly against Zayn’s grasp, but stayed pinned to the doorway. “Shut up. It’s not an act I can turn on and off. You—seriously, _you_ should get that. You don’t just get to flip a switch on a fucking _mental disorder.”_

“You could at least pretend to try!” Zayn let up with the pressure on Louis’ shoulders, spinning into the room.

“I _am_ trying, and it’s not getting any easier! It’s so hard it’s _literally_ killing me. And if you just can’t fucking deal with that, then you can get the fuck _out.”_

“This is you trying? Kicking me out?”

“Yup. Absolutely.”

“Fine, fuck off. Let me know when this ridiculous pattern finally gets old, yeah?” He picked up his jeans and shimmied into them as he continued to talk before yanking his shirt over his head. “Beneath all the sanctimonious bullshit, there’s probably someone who could actually have fun and a decent conversation, rather than a fucking shouting match every goddamn day.”

“Like I care if you stick around to find out.” Louis tracked his movements without shifting from the doorframe.

Zayn chuckled, sounding shocked. “See now, that? That is an act you can drop. Because I fucking _know_ that’s a lie. Everyone does.”

Louis plucked the cigarette from between his lips and stubbed it out in the ashtray he was still clutching. 

“Get out,” he whispered as he hurled the ashtray across the room. It narrowly missed Zayn’s face, shattering where it hit the wall by the door.

“With pleasure.” Zayn stepped easily around the broken glass and slammed the door behind him.

 

After staring at the closed door while seething, his vision going spotty, Louis spun on his heel and pulled his duvet and pillows off his bed. He stacked them all in the bottom of his closet and shut himself up tightly for the night.

He felt absolutely, utterly floored. And worse yet, he felt betrayed. Underneath the betrayal was a sense of surprise that he had trusted Zayn with some of his feelings—not that he was _in love_ with him, that was frankly ridiculous—only to have everything thrown back in his face.

Louis had no idea when he stopped _hating_ Zayn, but he thought he might have to pick the habit back up again.

 

***

When he woke up the next day and crawled from the wreckage of his defiled bedding, he scrounged for his wallet and a semi-clean set of clothes. Forgoing a shower, he pulled on a beanie and his beat-up Vans, leaving the house without a word, as usual.

Thirty minutes later found him sitting on a low bench waiting for the tattoo artist to finish the scripted mock-up of his banal yet relevant mantra of late. _It is what it is_

“You—you know the rules, right?” the artist, Tom, asked, eyeing Louis’ other tattoos.

“Yeah.”

“So, you’re not like drunk or anything right now?”

“Do I look drunk?”

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

“I’m not drunk.”

“Right. This way.”

He had Louis remove his shirt and sat the mock-up on his collarbones, warning him that it would be painful. 

“Yeah.”

“It’s on bones, mate. Not fleshy there, okay?”

Louis’ nostrils flared. “If I tip you 50% will you stop trying to talk me out of it?”

Tom snapped on a pair of medical-grade gloves. “Your funeral.” He bid Louis take a seat before he cleaned and shaved his skin, wiping the area thoroughly.

He set the wetted stencil carefully and began to arrange everything once Louis confirmed its placement. He worked on the outline in silence until Louis asked, “Do you ever think that, like, clients get off on this?”

“Yeah, sure,” Tom agreed. “Why? Do you?” He momentarily seemed to regret continuing their conversation, but shrugged it off easily enough.

“No. It’s more of a time-marker I guess. And it’s, like, centering.”

“That’s typical, yeah.”

“Anyone ever interviewed you for, like, the psychology behind tattoos?”

“Not really. Not sure there’s any way to interpret a black outline of a dolphin, or a barbed wire armband.”

“Oh.” Louis quieted down as Tom began to fill in the outlined black. He cast his eyes around the shop, listening to the buzzing and muffled conversation, enjoying the rumbling through his chest. He tried not to smirk as a clearly-underage lad tried to get a quote for an anchor on his bicep.

Louis waited while Tom talked to him before returning to wipe at Louis’ half-finished tattoo. “Suppose some things do have more symbolism than others,” Tom acquiesced.

Louis was filled with a desire to find a boat with an anchor and rope strong enough to sink his body beneath the sea.

***

His mother scowled at him the instant she saw the text peeking out of the collar of his cotton shirt. “I hate your tattoos, peanut, honestly,” she said with a sigh. “You have such lovely skin!”

Louis sucked down a sarcastic reply, although he noted that she only said things like that when she was cross with him. The only feature of his she randomly and repeatedly complimented him on were his cheekbones.

“You really ought to talk to your therapist about that, see to it somehow,” she added, sweeping out of the foyer and into the kitchen. “It’s pathological!”

His mind when cold and his face flamed up, the see-through protective layer itching against his new tattoo. He set his jaw and refused to say anything to her, lest he scream his voice hoarse. He instead slouched up the stairs, in pain and itchy, listening for more sounds from the rest of the household.

Fizzy yelled from her open doorway, “Lou, Lottie says answer your messages!”

Louis groaned. “Never fucking ends,” he muttered before calling, “What does she want?”

“No idea, ask her yourself!”

“Where is she?” he yelled, taking his mobile from his pocket.

_stop screaming, come to the guest room_

“Never mind!”

He stutter-stepped to the guest room, easing the door open. He had absolutely no idea what to expect inside it. He knew that, even if he had signals crossed deep inside his heart, that even if wires inside his brain fizzed so bright they electrocuted him—he knew he had some kind of obligation to walk into the room.

Lottie sat cross-legged at the head of the guestroom bed, only the side-table lamp on. Someone lay beneath the grey-and-white-striped coverlet, pillow tucked beneath a curly head of hair.

“Lots?”

“Shh, Lou, just come here.” She patted the duvet near her feet and her eyebrows creased at him, trying to communicate something.

Louis edged forward carefully, sitting by the footboard of the bed. _Shit._ “Haz, hey, what’s happening, here?”

She began patting Harry’s hair, running her finger through it gently. “He’s like, really out-of-it, I dunno what’s going on.”

“Hey, kid, can you look at me?” Louis nudged Harry’s foot gently, pulling the duvet back a bit to get a look at Harry’s face.

“Heyyy,” he drawled in return, sounding spaced-out and sleepy. Louis went on high-alert, his pulse rattling loudly inside his own head. Harry swung his chin down carelessly, mussing the pillow and his curls. His eyes were glassy as they met Louis’ own, his mouth languid but unhappy. “Hey, Louis. What’s, what’s, going on?”

“Hey, you’re all right. You’re fine. Can you answer a couple questions, babe?”

Harry blinked, licking his lips. “Sure.” His eyes filled with tears and he frowned.

“Did you take anything, huh? Drugs, like, or drink anything, love?”

“No, nope,” Harry shook his head, licking his lips again. “No.”

“Hey, Lottie, will you grab some water?” Louis whispered, not breaking eye contact with Harry. “Thanks.”

Lottie left the room and shut the door, enveloping them both in soft lighting from the side-table lamp. Harry was almost totally covered by blankets and the duvet, his face wan and small.

“Babe, hey. Look at me, yeah? Where were you before here, hm? Can you tell me?” Louis kept his voice quiet so as not to startle Harry unduly.

“Ben’s,” Harry said dreamily, eyes fluttering shut, “I was at Ben’s.”

“Okay, who is that? Or where is that? Did he give you something?”

“No, no, he’s—he wouldn’t do that, he’s nice.”

“He’s nice?” Louis whispered, swallowing hard.

“Yeah, like, he loves me. He’s nice.”

“You’re sure he didn’t give you anything?”

“I think I dropped, Louis.” Harry pouted, his bottom lip pushing outward obscenely.

“Dropped? What’d you drop, like, molly or sommat? You can tell me, baby, it’s okay.”

Harry preened slightly. “Baby.” He smiled, lids still shut. “Lou, ’s okay. Will you. Um. Play with my hair, please.” He pulled one arm out from under the duvet and tried to grasp for Louis without opening his eyes.

“Shit,” Louis whispered, clasping Harry’s hands with a grounding firmness. “Okay, it’s all right, princess, you’re fine.”

Harry laughed a little, a high-pitched, breathy giggle that sent Louis’ pulse plummeting. He was—Harry had always had a sweet and gangly childish air about him, darling and very beautiful. But at that moment he literally seemed like a _child._

Louis had no idea what to do.

“Hair, play, please,” Harry insisted lazily, still pouting a bit.

Louis shifted toward the head of the bed in order to cuddle Harry carefully, waiting until he fell into a doze before he pulled out his mobile to do extensive browser searching.

***

Louis’ neck ached when he woke up to Harry’s eyelashes kitten-light on his cheek. “Heyyy,” Harry drawled quietly. “Hey, Lou.”

“Hi, babe,” Louis croaked, nerves tingling through his gut. “How you feeling?”

“Snuggly,” Harry admitted, ducking the tip of his head beneath the crook of Louis’ chin.

“Yeah? You know what time it is?”

“No.”

“You think you could maybe drink some water for me?”

Harry hummed, considering, but slowly nodded. Louis picked up the glass of room-temperature water and helped Harry sit up to drink it. He watched Harry, who looked sleepy and sweet, like a baby animal. He set a reassuring hand on the back of Harry’s neck, supporting his movement.

“Good boy,” he murmured, “all right, now, not too fast.”

Harry spluttered a bit, retreating from the glass Louis held. He settled back down against the pillow, lashes fluttering in the half-light. Louis sat the glass back down on the side-table.

“Haz?”

“Yeah.”

“I wonder if maybe you can tell me what happened.”

“What?” Harry’s eyes shot open wide, his jaw dropping. His body went totally rigid. “When? What happened when?”

“I just want to make sure you’re okay, baby, that you don’t need a doctor or something.” 

Louis was fairly sure Harry didn’t need a medical intervention.

“I think I dropped, Lou,” Harry added earnestly, throwing a lanky arm over Louis’ middle and tugging him close.

“Yeah, babe, and you were here when that happened?”

“I dunno. I called Lottie to see if you two had time to hang out or whatever and that’s the last thing that just—I got really upset, I guess.”

“You didn’t take anything? Like molly or shrooms or sommat?”

“No, I didn’t take anything.” Harry pouted again, shoving his bottom lip out, pink and spit-slick.

Louis planted a kiss against his temple. “Who’s Ben?”

Harry went rigid again. “Did I—?”

“You mentioned him.”

“He’s no one.”

“What’d he _do_ though? To—make you drop?”

Harry looked at him, eyes bright with tears. “He’s married, Lou.”

“I’m not going to tell, love. I just—need to make sure you’re okay. You’re a _kid.”_

Harry buried his face into Louis’ neck, not quite crying, not quite stoic. Louis let him go silent, pliant, for so long he lost track of time.

 

Eventually Louis let Harry get out of bed before he did, let Harry move his gangly legs carefully along the soft carpet as he entered the bathroom. Louis turned to one side, cracking an eye as he thought that maybe, probably, he had no idea what he was doing.

He eased his way out of bed and put his feet flat on the floor, siting cagily on the edge of the bed. He set his elbows on top of his thighs and sighed, only looking up when Harry emerged from the bathroom. 

“So, sub-dropping then. Can you—that is, is that what happened?”

“Yeah.” Harry bit his bottom lip and stopped in the middle of the room, looking thin and vulnerable. He rubbed one bare foot on his opposite ankle.

“Yeah. I did some searching while you slept. It—it sounds like bad news, Haz.”

Harry shook his head slowly. “I was fine when I left his place. I dunno, it—it’s never been like that. There’s always a come-down or whatever, but never this bad. Ever. He’s careful. We’re careful.”

 

_You’re just a kid with a pathological need to be loved._

 

“This hasn’t ever happened before?” Louis muttered, rubbing his hands together.

“No.”

“And—how many times have you done this? Like, how often do you—are you normally okay?”

“On and off for a few months. When his wife’s, um, on business trips, mostly.” Again, he looked small and so, so vulnerable. “I’m normally just fine.” He folded his arms across his chest, tucking his chin down. “And I know—the wife thing, it’s a cliché, I know that. But I just, like. I can’t not.”

“Oh, Harry,” Louis murmured. _what are we going to do with you?_ He opened his arms wide and was gratified when Harry tucked against his side, nuzzling his nose into Louis’ neck. “How are you feeling now?”

“Bit better. Still kinda weepy.”

“You worried me, kid.”

Harry snuffled, digging harder into Louis’ side. “You were really—you took care of me. I shouldn’t have asked you for that.”

“You didn’t ask.”

“I shouldn’t have needed it.”

“We all need someone sometimes.” Louis tipped them both backwards so he was leaning against the headboard, Harry pressed against his chest.

“Well, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize for—that. You’re allowed to need someone.”

“I don’t like—how, how much I feel like I need people. How I let people just—” He cut himself off with a choked sound.

“Use you?”

“Use me.”

“Why do you do that then?”

“It’s not simple.”

“No. The truth usually isn’t.”

Harry took a deep breath. “He loves me.”

“Haz, I’m not so sure he does.”

“You don’t know him.”

“He’s not being safe with you. And that’s not okay.”

Harry groaned gently, his voice gravelly and thick.

“I’m just not sure you should be doing this, H, if this is the result.”

“It’s never happened before, like I said.”

“You—I don’t want to lecture. Sorry.”

“Go on.”

“You need to take care of yourself. The world fucking blows, okay, so you need to, like, make sure no one’s going to take advantage of you.”

“People will take advantage of me regardless. At least—” Harry’s voice cracked. “At least it can be on my terms, this way.”

“That’s fucked, love. That’s so fucked.”

“What do you care?” Harry whispered, eyes squeezed shut.

“I—I care, H, crap. I _care.”_ And again came the raging hurt, the betrayal that Louis could not make any sense of, no matter who inspired it.

“But _you_ don’t love me.”

“I do love you.”

“You know what I mean. Love in-love.”

“Nah, you don’t want me.”

“Always do. Always will.”

“Should look to that.” Louis sucked in a deep, sustaining breath. “Is it like a self-sabotage thing, with you? I don’t get it.”

“I think you get it better than you’re letting on.” Harry’s voice, somehow, lacked accusation, even as he said things dark and frightening.

“My self-sabotage is made entirely of drug use and ill-advised tattoos, bro. I fuck because I want to.”

“Sure. Okay. Right.”

“Look, I know it sounds like delusional crap, but whatever.”

“I didn’t say it was delusional crap,” Harry whispered, pleading.

“Sex doesn’t have to be a weapon, but it can be, you know.”

“He’s not trying to hurt me, he wouldn’t do that on purpose.”

“What, and that means you won’t get hurt? That means the situation doesn’t absolutely suck? That means you magically won’t ever get let down, because his intentions are so pure?”

“You’re not being fair.”

“I don’t have to be fair to him. He hurt you.”

“No, he didn’t. This is my thing, not his.”

“He should have taken care of you.”

“We all should have done a lot of things differently, I reckon.”

Louis was silent, biting at the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood.

“That’s not a dig at you, you know,” Harry murmured. “People make mistakes, and that’s the way it is.”

“Doesn’t mean you need to excuse them.”

“Why shouldn’t I?”

“Because eventually the broken bits won’t fit back together anymore.”

Harry frowned. “You think I’m broken?” he asked in a scared, small voice.

“No, but, shit, H, that doesn’t mean that something won’t tip you there sooner rather than later! You can’t just—you’ve got to keep a closer watch—“ Louis trailed off, exasperated.

Harry breathed out a shocked laugh, scrubbing one hand over his face. He half-sang, half muttered, “I keep a close watch on this heart of mine.”

“Stop it. You owe it to yourself, you know?” And with that, Louis had a firm grasp of his own terrible, horrible hypocrisy.

“I don’t owe anything to anyone.”

“Yeah, well, you’re right, of course, but you know you’ve had this exact conversation with me. With me on the receiving end.”

“Being suicidal and banging a married dude aren’t the same thing, Lou.”

“You’re the one who said it was a cliché. So’s the self-hating gay boy thing, I’ve been told.”

“Well, guess we’re two sides of the same coin, then.”

Louis groaned. “What is it with everyone trying to teach me a lesson lately?”

Harry sucked his lower lip into his mouth, sucking on it lightly. “That’s—part of relationships, isn’t it? Imparting ideas, growing together. Sharing things.”

“I don’t want to use anyone as a model for future functioning. Not anyone I know, anyway. I love but, babe, but shit.”

Harry scoffed, surprisingly loudly. “You don’t love me. That’s—it’s not insulting though. Or whatever. It get it. I’m not bothered.” He sounded resigned and very sullen.

“Hey, it’s—not like that. I love you, but like. I’m not good at the actual being-in-love thing. And that’s what seems to be wrong with me, one of the many, all right? Not at the top of the list. I’m not made for love.”

He shook his head raggedly from where it was tucked into Louis’ skin. “For now. You say that now.”

“And think of what _you_ say now. That he loves you but let you fall like that after fucking you to pieces. Is that love?”

“I make do.” Louis felt Harry’s jaw clench.

“With what? Someone who can’t actually give you what you need? Someone willing to fuck a _kid?”_

“I’m old enough.”

“Barely.”

“I really—let’s just drop the lectures.” Harry half-frowned, half-pouted. But he was still tucked against Louis, and that was something.

“Okay,” Louis agreed slowly. “So where’d you meet his guy? The boyfriend?”

“I’m not the boyfriend, I’m the piece on the side.” Harry sucked in a shallow breath. “We met at a club. Blackleaf.”

“You’re not old enough to get into the Blackleaf.”

“I do okay,” Harry assured him.

“And he—what, works there?”

“Owns it.”

“Big spender?”

“Dunno. Suppose.”

“Didn’t know you were quite so…subby.” 

Louis tried to keep judgment and pain out of his voice, but he was having difficulties. He had met Harry when he was vulnerable and young and afraid to be gay, and to see Harry so altered was frightening. Louis was frightened. His gut clenched despite his calming efforts, and his heart rate sped.

“I’m figuring it out, I guess.”

Louis nodded. “What do you do?”

“Why?”

He reconsidered his tactics, vying for anything that would give him more information. “Whose idea was it?”

Harry shifted away form Louis, opening up cool air between their bodies. “I dunno. Mine, I guess.”

“Why?”

“I—we all need someone, sometimes.”

Again, the repetition. Always the repetition. Louis considered this for a long time. “I miss you.”

“Lou. I saw you earlier this week,” Harry said quietly, but Louis heard a smile in his voice.

“You know what I mean.”

“I’m right here.”

Louis pressed a warm hand against the slit of Harry’s hip that he could see. “Now, maybe. Sometimes. Took awhile to get you back.”

“It wasn’t—expected.”

“I know.”

“It wasn’t even a very intense scene, really. I was just really deep into it.”

“It’s not, like, your role to be okay right away. That’s what _he’s_ supposed to do.”

Harry sucked in his bottom lip. “Did a lot of reading, did you?”

Louis nodded. “And I have some experience with all this.”

“Then why are you judging me for this?”

“Because as much as, you know, like. As much as Zayn hates me, he’d never do… _that.”_

_except, well, hadn’t he? Hadn’t he done, kind of, just that?_

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly have nothing against Ben, but I needed an older, sort of domineering male figure, and, well. Whatever.  
> I'm so sorry.
> 
> Come yell at me. Lord knows I deserve it.
> 
> tumblr: musiclily


End file.
